But one of the men had caught something on his fork and extracted it from the food on his plate. It was an overlooked wick. The major's wife had begun to boil up the tallow candles. [Fact.] But the cheer that shook that rough log roof came right from hearts that blessed her, and brought her to the door of the men's mess-room. The men were on their feet instantly. "A light has broken upon us, or rather within us, Mrs. Lysle!" cried a self-selected spokesman.
"Illuminating, isn't it, boys?" She laughed, then turned away, for the cheers and tears were very close together.
Then one day when even starving stomachs almost revolted at the continued coarse mixture, a ribbon of blue proclaimed the open sea, and into those waters swept the longed-for ship. Yet, strangely enough, that night the "Mother o' the Men" wept a storm of tears, the only tears she had yielded to in those long five years. For with its blessing of food the ship had her hold bursting with liquors and wines, the hideous commerce that invades the pioneer places of the earth. Should the already weakened, ill-fed and scurvy-threatened garrison break into those supplies, all the labor and patience and mothering of this courageous woman would be useless, for after a bean diet in the Northern latitudes, whiskey is deadly to brain and body, and the victim maddens or dies.
"You are crying, mother, and the ship here at last!" said Grahamie's voice at her shoulder. "Crying when we are all so happy."
"Mother is a little upset, dear. You must try to forget you ever saw her eyes wet."
"I'll forget," said the boy with a finality she could not question. "The ship is so full of good things, mother. We'll think of that, and—forget, won't we?" he added.
"All the things in the ship are not good, Grahamie, boy. If they were, mother would not cry," she said.
"I see," he said, but stole from her side with a strained, puzzled look in his young eyes.
Outside he was met by a laughing, joyous dozen of men. One swung the child to his shoulder, shouting, "Hurrah, little 'North-West'! Hurrah! we are all coming to pay tribute to your mother. Look at the dainties we have got for her from the ship!"
"I'm afraid you can't see mother just now," said the boy. "Mother is a little upset. You see, the ship is so full of good things—but then, all the things in the ship are not good. If they were, mother would not cry." In the last words he unconsciously imitated his mother's voice.